The Girl in the Fireplace

Well now- I know IВ’ve been saying that weВ’ve been seeing the restoration of the Doctor as the central figure this season and the consequent downgrading of the significance of the Rose character but the hitherto asexual Doctor becoming so infatuated with an (admittedly attractive) French aristocrat so as to potentially abandon Rose,and Mickey,Sapphire and Steel like,in space forever?Hmm.So there you go,broad-minded and generally supportive as I have tried to be about the new era perhaps I am just an old fart after all and becoming,according to my friend,more like the hardcore every day-I think I know what he means by this.

However,the fact that I struggled with this,and some other aspects,such as the graphic snog,which made the New Earth kiss positively boring by comparison(poor old Rose has even got upstaged on that by Madame Pompadou),and the DoctorВ’s silly pissed routine(mind you it was for a reason and sometimes Doctors do silly things for a reason,like PertweeВ’s disguise in the Green Death,say)cannot detract from some superb elements which comprised what was essentially an adult fairy tale likely to be of limited appeal to younger viewers.Visually the episode was stunning,and some children will be genuinely frightened by the clockwork robots(nods to the Mind Robber there) which were superbly realised,though the voices were rather bland.Clocks ticking,old fireplaces,time portals,horses on spaceships(if we can have sailing ships in space in Enlightenment,thereВ’s no reason why we canВ’t have horses): all good stuff,and the idea of the Doctor appearing at various stages of PompadouВ’s life,not growing old as she does,is a poignant continuation of the Doctor/Sarah discussion in School Reunion.

ThereВ’s no doubting Steven MoffatВ’s brilliance as a writer but boy does he seem preoccupied by sex!References to it permeate the Empty Child/the Doctor Dances where dancingВ’s just a metaphor for sex and here references and hints are abandoned altogether in favour of full-on lust.Still,this season is proving itself capable of great variety if nothing else.

Despite my struggles with some aspects,this was an intelligent,visually flawless story proving that new Who isnВ’t some sort of juvenile CBBC pantomime not worthy of comparision to the classic era as some I assume still believe.On the contrary,it seems a little too adult at times.Probably a notch down though from the brilliant Empty Child/Doctor Dances due to time constraints.